If there’s one person more pissed than Vasiliy Lomachenko 17-3 (11) about losing his undisputed lightweight title bid to Devin Haney 30-0 (15) on the weekend, it’s retired former world champion turned pundit Paulie Malinaggi.
Ukrainian southpaw Lomachenko, 35, appeared to have the edge on the cards against Haney, but the 24-year-old American was awarded the victory from the judges by scores of 116-112 and 115-113 twice at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada on Saturday night.
Malignaggi was not happy with the result.
“I’m not going to give praise to a robbery. Haney has got the undisputed title. It’s a beautiful thing for him and his fans but come on, this wasn’t good for boxing. No one thought this was good. Nobody thinks he won the fight,” Malignaggi said on his YouTube channel.
“It’s such a turn-off and last week with [Ismael] Barroso getting screwed with the [Rolando] Rolly [Romero] stoppage. It’s really, really irritating because this is a guy [Lomachenko] with legendary status. He deserved better to allow Lomachenko to go out the way he wanted.
“Boxing is supposed to be better than that, but it’s not been better than that, even in the past. Some of the scorecards too. David Moretti scored it 116-112. Like I said before, if you gave more than six rounds to Haney, you’re borderline on being a scumbag.
“You’re probably already a scumbag because a 6-6, you’re maxing out the excuses to give the rounds that you’re giving to Haney. [David] Sutherland and [Tim] Cheatham don’t escape this either.
“Moretti gave nine and 10 to Haney. Haney got assaulted in rounds nine, 10 and 11. It was literally an assault. In the 11th, he almost got stopped. This guy is giving rounds to Haney. It’s mind-boggling.
“It’s not incompetence. I got these people making these excuses. You guys got to stop making these built-in excuses [for the judges]. ‘Oh, this guy is old. This guy is a dinosaur.’ If every time you guys are going to make these excuses, these people are going to take them and run with them.
“You got to stop making excuses for these people. They’re scumbags and they do it over and over again. One of these days, somebody is going to beat the shit out of one of these officials.
“Somebody is going to have had it and you guys are going to get the shit beat out of you. It’s going to be sad. I don’t vote for it, but if it happened, I probably wouldn’t even feel bad. When you see things like this, it’s supremely irritating in the manner in which it’s done.
“You’re making a fool out of me. You’re giving rounds nine and 10 to Haney. Now you’re making a jerkoff out of me. Why are you judging the fight? Why is the commission still hiring you?
“Moretti’s scorecard, they were all bad, but Moretti in the manner in which he got his scorecard was unbelievable. It’s not like the rant is going to solve boxing. I could be going on these rants until I’m on my deathbed. They’re never going to fix this. It’s a ridiculous thing.
“It’s probably not going to be the last time it happened. Every time it happens, guys deserve better. Lomachenko had to give an extra million dollars to Haney in order to get the fight done because Haney wanted a million dollars out of Lomachenko’s portion of the purse. So he had to give that up too.
“People don’t look at the little subtleties that go into all of this, and then somebody gets robbed. It’s a real, real shame. It’s not going to get solved.
“I thought it was a horrible, horrible decision in a fight that was so big that a lot of casuals were watching and boxing managed to kick itself in the ass.
“Stop making excuses for these guys. Call it out for what it is and demand better. People make excuses for people who are corrupt.”
